What is laravel-ftp-deployer?

Laravel FTP Deployer is a PHP tool built for developers stuck with hosting providers that only offer FTP or SFTP access, not SSH. Laravel projects normally rely on Artisan, a command line tool, to run database migrations, clear caches, and toggle maintenance mode. Without SSH, those commands cannot be run directly on the server, which creates real problems when you need to deploy an update. This package solves that by packaging changed files into a single ZIP archive instead of uploading files one at a time. It tracks file changes locally using MD5 hashes stored in a manifest file, so only files that changed since the last deploy get zipped and uploaded. Once the ZIP reaches the server over FTP, a small temporary PHP helper script unpacks it, sets correct folder permissions on the storage and cache directories, clears out stale cached configuration to avoid errors, and runs the Artisan commands you specify, all while the site is placed in maintenance mode so visitors do not see a broken page. After the process finishes, both the ZIP file and the helper script are deleted automatically. Setup uses Composer to install the package. Credentials are read from a .env.prod file if present, or a regular .env file otherwise. A deploy.json file, created automatically on first run, lets you exclude certain files or folders and define custom groups of Artisan commands to run. A first time deployment mode exists for pushing a full copy of the app to a brand new empty server, bypassing the usual exclusion rules. This is a small, focused tool aimed at solo developers or small teams working with restrictive shared hosting. It does not include a web dashboard or team features, just command line usage through Composer's vendor/bin folder. The project is licensed under MIT, so it can be used freely, including for commercial projects.